


Agent Carter on the Eve of War

by onethingconstant



Series: Agent Carter Forever [2]
Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Civil War prequel, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hospice, Hugs, Recovering!Bucky, alzheimer's, civil war spoilers, spy games
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-06
Updated: 2016-05-06
Packaged: 2018-06-06 17:22:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6763147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onethingconstant/pseuds/onethingconstant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On an otherwise unimportant-seeming  day, Peggy Carter receives two very important visitors: the Winter Soldier and the woman who will change her life—and his—forever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Agent Carter and the Lost Sergeant

**Author's Note:**

> DO NOT READ THIS BEFORE YOU SEE CIVIL WAR.
> 
> Hello, all! I'm sorry to have been absent for so long. The dreaded Real Life happened, mostly in the form of work crap and mental-health issues. I still plan to finish Left-Hand Man, but I will also be working on a Peggy-centric sequel to Civil War (which I have just seen and OH MY GOSH GO SEE IT). This piece, which is half an epilogue I originally wrote for Left-Hand Man and half a scene I wrote a few hours after leaving the theater, is a bridge between the two.
> 
> The only actual spoiler here is probably the worst-kept secret of the Civil War storyline—that Steve loses Peggy before the movie is over. Except screw that. Peggy Carter is an immortal goddess of kickassery, and this fic begins the process of proving that to anyone who still needed convincing.
> 
> Also, Bucky gets a much-needed hug.

The hospital was private, and expensive. It required that visitors show multiple forms of identification, or be on the patient's approved list. 

Bucky sweated the preparations for weeks. He started shaving again, every day, to get the right look to his skin and get out of the habit of nervously scratching at his stubble. Got his hair trimmed shorter, even though it felt wrong not to have that protective curtain hiding his face. Stole a couple of wallets on the subway and used the proceeds to tidy himself up—slick new clothes, a good watch (the salesgirl gave him a strange look on that one) and a nice aftershave and cologne.

He paid an underworld contact entirely too much money to create a legend for him, including multiple IDs in several names. He couldn't decide who he wanted to be for her. He'd figure it out on the day.

He waited until he knew Steve would be out of town. Waited until all the reliable chatter said Steve and his team were chasing terrorists in Lagos for some godforsaken reason. And then he walked up to the young man at the reception desk, smiled the ghost of his most charming smile, and got the shock of his afterlife.

"Mr. Barnes. This is a surprise! Never thought I'd meet Sketch Guy in person."

Bucky blinked.

"First time here, right?" The young man smiled. "You've got great timing. She's having a good day today—she'll be glad to see you."

Bucky mumbled, "Sketch Guy?" Alarm bells were screaming in his head. This wasn't right. Nobody was supposed to recognize him. _How the hell—?_

The young man turned his computer monitor to face Bucky. Sure enough, there on the screen was a headline reading _Visitor Information_ , a few lines of text, and, yes, a beautiful, eerily lifelike sketch portrait of Bucky.

With short hair. Smiling. 

Bucky's heart dropped into his stomach even before he saw Steve's hesitant little scribble-signature in the lower right corner. The flood of memories washed over him before he could stop them. 

_You call that a signature, punk?_

_Lay off, Buck. It's an Eat-At-Joe's sign, not a Rembrandt._

_Yeah, but it's gonna be worth a lotta money someday. Future generations'll wanna be able to read your signature on it. It'll be worth more that way._

_Yeah, they'll be linin' up around the block for the finest firewood money can buy. Bushwah._

_Just a little bigger? C'mon._

_Awright already._

Bucky shook the memory away. He'd already written that one down. But it looked like Steve had never gotten over being self-conscious about putting his name on his own work. Even if he'd made Bucky look twice as handsome as he'd ever been in real life.

"You're a little famous around here since Captain Rogers added you to the approved list a few months ago," the young man was telling him. "Said he didn't have a recent photo, so he sketched you on the back of a requisition form." He chuckled. "By the time he was done, we had a dozen nurses hanging around, watching Captain America shade the cleft in your chin. Said he was sure you'd be coming by, wanted to make it easy on you. How d'you know him, anyway?"

"Work," Bucky muttered, looking at his shoes. "Classified."

The man raised his hands. "Say no more. Except, uh, I'm still gonna need to see at least one legal ID. Rules, you know."

Bucky felt his heart stop. Somehow Steve had put him on Peggy's approved list as James Barnes, and that was the one identity he didn't have papers on. It would ping too many systems to go by that. He had nothing with that name on it, except—

Bucky licked his lips nervously, reached into his shirt, and pulled out the dog tags hanging from a ball chain around his neck.

They weren't his real tags, of course. Not his original ones. Those had been lost decades ago, probably destroyed early in his time at Hydra. They hadn't wanted him to remember his name, after all. Or anything they didn't tell him.

But damn, you really could find anything on the internet, and he'd found a guy in Chattanooga with a vintage World War II Addressograph machine, stamping out retro dog tags in the back of an Army surplus store.

Eight bucks. That's how much it had cost Bucky to feel like a stand-up soldier again. Like a human being. Plus another dollar for the rubber silencers they hadn't had in the war, because the jingle of the double tags clinking together drove him crazy now. He hadn't taken them off since. He slept in them, clutching them with his human hand the way he used to hold his rifle.

He lifted the chain over his head, ignoring the tremor that ran through him as he surrendered his hard-won identity, and set the dog tags on the desk in a silent plea.

The young man peered at them. "Okay, that works for me." He smiled up at Bucky, clearly unaware of how close he'd come to being on the receiving end of a Winter Soldier meltdown. "She's in Room 312. You need an escort to help you find it?"

Bucky shook his head mutely and took his tags back. He dropped them quickly over his head again one-handed, keeping his left hand inside the pocket of his leather jacket. The shakes subsided.

He found the room easily enough, albeit with a few grins from nurses and one mouthing _sketch guy_ at him. Steve would definitely hear about this from them next time he came to visit. 

Bucky wasn't sure how he felt about that. He knew Steve was looking for him, knew he didn't want to be found yet—if ever. But he knew Steve was worried, too. It was the natural state of Steve Rogers, along with being up to his ears in trouble. And maybe knowing that Bucky had done something as safe and normal as visiting a sick friend in the hospital—maybe that would lift some of the weight from Steve's shoulders when Bucky couldn't be there to do it himself. Maybe Peggy Carter could do what Bucky Barnes couldn't.

Today was supposed to be about Peggy. But it was okay to throw Steve a bone, too.

He took a deep breath, steeled himself, and slipped into the room, closing the door carefully behind him. When he looked up, it was into a pair of piercing brown eyes.

His first thought was: _Is that what I'm supposed to be?_

God, she looked old. Still beautiful, but old. He recognized the cheekbones, the curve of her mouth, the way her hands crossed secretively over her stomach as she half-reclined in her hospital bed. And the look she was giving him, halfway between recognition and shock.

Good old Peggy Carter. She never forgot a face.

"Ma'am," Bucky said respectfully, pulling himself up straight and saluting. "Reporting for duty." 

"Bucky?" she croaked. Even her voice sounded old, creaky and ancient. But there was that sharpness underneath it still, that steel edge. Good to know Alzheimer's hadn't taken everything.

"Yes, ma'am," Bucky replied, still at attention. He wasn't sure what he was going to do next. If he actually had to look at her, or do anything he hadn't done a million times with people he didn't care about, he was probably going to cry. And he didn't want to do that to Peggy Carter.

"Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes?" She sounded incredulous, her voice getting louder and stronger.

"Yes'm." He gave a shaky smirk. "You want I should give my serial number?"

There was a sharp intake of breath from Peggy. Bucky held his.

"Sergeant Barnes," Peggy said crisply. "Are you still under my command?"

Maybe she _was_ a little gaga, thought it was still the war. Might as well play along. "Yes, ma'am." He stared fixedly at the wall above her bed.

"Then get your sorry arse over here this instant."

Bucky was so startled that he looked, and saw her smiling at him through unshed tears.

He moved slowly, like he had been trained to do and also because he didn't want to scare her. This woman knew who he was, what he could do. Knew he was death on two legs. Knew he was poison. 

And, he remembered as he approached, she had once kindly promised to kill him at the next opportunity.

When he got close to the bed, he didn't bother pulling up a chair. He sank down on his knees beside her, like he'd done a thousand times to show submission to the people who owned him. Put his throat and his brain at her eye level—because come on, would Peggy Carter _not_ have a pistol or a blade hidden somewhere? And if this was her way of bringing him in close enough to finally finish the job—well, he was sorry about the mess and sorry it would be her, after all this time, who had to do it, but a promise was a promise. He couldn't make her renege. It wouldn't be right.

But no weapon appeared from under the sheets and blankets. Her smile didn't waver. She just held out her arms to him and the tears finally spilled.

And that was when Bucky realized he wasn't going to die today after all.

"Peggy?" he asked, his voice unable to rise above a whisper.

She crooked her fingers, and he leaned in. One hand spread itself across his back, and the other cupped the back of his head like an infant's. Peggy didn't pull, but Bucky let the gentle pressure of her grip guide him into the hug.

He ended up with his head resting in the hollow of her neck and her other arm holding him tight against her body. A shiver ran through them both, and Bucky was surprised to realize it had come from him.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. It was the first time he'd been able to say it, to anyone, since waking up on the shore of the Potomac. But this, like a lot of things, was somehow easier with Peggy. "I'm so sorry."

"It wasn't your fault," she murmured. "Steve told me all about it. You weren't to blame."

"I let 'em do it," Bucky whimpered. "Just—just lay back and took it." His eyes stung.

"You had no choice. We all know that."

"Not everything," Bucky insisted. "Not—not what I did—"

"I know more than Steve does."

Bucky lifted his head enough to look her in the eyes. They were as clear and sharp as they'd been the last time he saw them, over half a century before.

"I was director of SHIELD," she reminded him. "I've probably forgotten more about the Winter Soldier than you'll ever know. I never stopped looking. Never stopped hoping."

"I was waiting for you," he whispered. "For the bullet."

"Idiot," she said, with a smile. "It was never going to be a bullet." She tilted his head down enough to allow her to press her lips lightly against his forehead. He moaned and shuddered, let her tuck his head against her thin shoulder. He could feel her bones through her nightgown, thin and delicate. Old people's bones always reminded him of bird bones somehow.

 _Don't think about it_ , he told himself sternly. _You're not breaking necks anymore._

Softly wrinkled fingers played gently through his hair, teasing it out of part. Bucky sighed, closed his eyes, and went limp. He'd forgotten this. Nobody had touched his hair, except to pull him by it, in decades. He'd forgotten how good it felt to be touched and not hurt.

Peggy reached over with one hand and threaded her fingers through his human ones. "It's all right," she murmured. "You're safe. You're home." 

Bucky said nothing, but he felt his muscles relaxing without being told. Something in him trusted Peggy absolutely, even with his memories still a wreck, and he was learning to trust his body about things like that. God knows he couldn't trust his mind.

They stayed like that, still and touching, for what might have been five minutes or an hour. Bucky let his internal clock switch off, and he let himself soak in Peggy's presence. He didn't sleep, exactly, but he drifted. He had forgotten what it was like to be with someone who trusted him. Someone who loved him.

After about a century of perfect quiet, Peggy carded her fingers through his hair, dragging her nails gently over his scalp. "James," she said, her voice quavering slightly. "Bucky?"

"Yeah, Peg?" He opened his eyes, prepared for whatever might come next. He'd read up on Alzheimer's before he came, and he knew almost anything could happen. She could forget him while she was looking right at him, or think he was her dead husband or something.

In a way, he reflected, Peggy was the best person for him to spend time with right now. She was used to the past and present overlapping.

"You haven't spoken to him, have you?"

So she did remember. He didn't move except for the sigh, which stirred the thin fabric of her nightgown. No question about who _him_ was. "I can't."

"Tell me."

Bucky growled softly in his throat. "I just _can't_."

"Can't or won't?"

"I'm not ready. Not sure I'll ever be."

The fingers tightened in his hair. "Idiot."

"Ow." It didn't really hurt, but he lifted his head to look at her anyway. "What's the big idea?"

Peggy glared at him. "How many people have tried to kill you in the last two years?" she demanded.

Bucky shifted uncomfortably. "Lost count," he mumbled.

"How many have tried to kill Steve?"

"Forty-seven." Of course he knew that. He followed news of Steve compulsively, had done so ever since he'd realized who Steve was and that he could be Googled. "Plus all the Ultrons."

"You stupid, _stupid_ man." Peggy placed her hands on Bucky's cheeks, holding his head steady and forcing him to look at her. "How much time do you imagine the two of you have? You boys lost each other once. Are you really going to risk losing each other again because—what? You think he won't accept you as you are?" She patted his left cheek hard enough that it was almost a slap. "He needs you, you daft boy. And you need him."

"He's better off without me," Bucky said mulishly. "I'm no good for him."

Peggy's eyes were narrow. "He tried to burn the world down, and himself with it, because he didn't want to be separated from you again. You might think he's better off without you, but he clearly disagrees. And when has either one of you cared a whit about what was good for you, anyway?"

Bucky made a miserable sound in the back of his throat.

"Idiot." Peggy pulled him in for another forehead kiss, then let him go. "Promise me you'll find him. Soon."

"I can't—"

"Promise me," she said firmly, "that I will see the both of you in one room at the same time, while I can still knock your heads together."

That earned a ghost-smile. "O—okay, Peg."

"Damn right." She settled herself more comfortably in bed. "And then you boys are taking me out for an evening. I haven't been dancing or had a proper drink in ages."

Bucky chuckled. It was small and broken, but it was his first real laugh since he'd opened his eyes on that riverbank and known his name.

"How've you been, Peg?" he asked, suddenly wanting to know everything. "I missed you."

Peggy pointed at the visitor's chair to her right, in front of the window. _Just where Steve would put it_ , Bucky thought, amazed that he remembered little things like how Steve liked having natural light at his back when he looked at people he loved. 

"It's not a short story," Peggy told him.

Bucky smiled, stood up, and pulled the chair over until it was only inches from the bed. He dropped into it, knees brushing the side rail, and took Peggy's two hands in his one human one. "I wanna hear it all," he said.

Peggy arched a silver eyebrow, withdrew one hand, and pointed to Bucky's left side. His metallic arm hung loose there, hand still in the pocket, in standby mode so it wouldn't make any noise. The servomotors had been whining more of late, but he couldn't get it serviced without going back to Hydra or, worse, tracking down Tony Stark, so he just did without it whenever he needed the quiet. He hadn't wanted to upset Peggy with the noise of his buggy prosthetic. She deserved better than that.

Obviously Peggy had other ideas.

Grudgingly, Bucky performed the tiny shrug that switched the arm off standby, and it came whirring to life as he pulled his hand out of his pocket. He held it out to Peggy, let her take it gently.

She turned the hand over, inspecting the palm and fingers. Then she placed his two hands together and folded her own over them.

Bucky's throat felt thick. He hated his arm. It was a heavy, noisy reminder of everything he'd done, everything that had been done to him. It was a piece of Hydra, permanently welded to his body. He would have taken a blowtorch to it right after he escaped if Steve hadn't broken his human arm in that last fight. And now needed two hands to work a rifle, two hands to drive a getaway car. He didn't know how to function with only one arm and he had no time, no safe place to learn, and that was really the only reason he hadn't tried to amputate it since the bone had healed. If he cut it off, he might diminish his combat effectiveness enough that Hydra would be able to take him back.

He kept the arm because it was his least horrible option. He'd never expected anyone to treat it like a thing worthy of respect. 

And Peggy was touching it. Like it was any other part of him. Bucky was pretty sure he'd break down in tears if she didn't stop looking at him like that.

"Very well," Peggy said, with a little smile that suggested she knew exactly what was flying through Bucky's head at the moment. "I suppose the first thing you should know is that your sister Becca was much happier as a SHIELD agent than she ever was as a telephone operator ..."


	2. Agent Carter and the Last Debrief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peggy has one more visitor, with a very particular purpose.

They spent hours together, and Barnes looked exhausted but happy as he slipped out around sunset. So happy, in fact, that he didn't even notice the woman in navy-blue scrubs lingering at a nurse's station, watching him from the corner of one eye.

She waited until he was gone, then let herself into the old woman's room.

Peggy Carter was small and sunken in her bed now, clearly drained by the effort of entertaining an old friend for so long. Her eyelids fluttered as the second visitor scuffed a sensible shoe on the tile floor.

"Good evening, Margaret," the woman said, in a soft Southern drawl.

Peggy made a face. "Do we have to use that name?" she murmured. "It sounds like someone's horrible maiden aunt."

"You thought of it," the visitor pointed out, and she dropped into the still-warm visitor's chair with a contented sigh and crossed her legs.

"Mind the accent," Peggy told her. "Your vowels are a little too long for South Carolina."

"I'm from Alabama this week."

"What, by choice?" Peggy's eyes opened wide. "Don't be gauche."

"Had a job in Atlanta. Needed to sound local, but not _that_ local."

"That sounds like something Dottie Underwood would say," Peggy said flatly. "Do an old woman a kindness, Margot, and stop offending her ears."

Margot grinned, and her brown eyes flashed. "I knew I could get a rise out of you." The drawl had vanished, replaced by the clipped consonants of Hampstead.

"Much better," Peggy murmured, her eyes drooping again. 

"Don't fall asleep yet," Margot said sharply. "We've got a debrief to do. I think—" She hesitated.

"You _know_ ," Peggy corrected. "As do I. It won't be long now. Probably tonight, in fact."

"I'm sorry," Margot said.

"Stuff and nonsense. As I'm always telling Steve, I've lived a life." She gave Margot a sidelong glance, and their brown eyes twinkled in unison. "Though perhaps I've been a little unclear in my grammar." She lifted a trembling hand from her covers and reached for the visitor's chair. "And soon it'll be time to live another."

"Anything to report, Agent Carter?" Margot asked, extending her fingers so that they hovered barely an inch from Peggy's.

"Plenty," Peggy replied. "It's time to go to work."

—

Peggy was sleeping by the end of the debrief, and Margot knew in her bones that the old lady had been right. Time to go to work, indeed. But it was better this way, she supposed. More complete. A good day. A gentle sleep. And a clear conscience all around.

She signed off on a fake timesheet at the nurse's station.

"You must be new," the man at the registration desk commented as she walked by.

"Just subbing," she called back, flashing him a smile. Her accent was from Brooklyn now. The symmetry appealed to her. She pulled the elastic out of her hair, undoing her ponytail and shaking her dark brown curls free. She'd always liked the simplicity of the ponytail, but there was something about literally letting her hair down that she found irresistibly relaxing. God bless the twenty-first century; not a curler in sight.

She realized the young man was staring. "What?" she asked, keeping her look of polite interest carefully in place.

He shook his head. "Just ... has anybody ever told you that you look like Peggy Carter?"

"What, like from the Captain America stories?"

"No, she's a real person," the man insisted. "And you look a _lot_ like her."

Margot tilted her head and covered her mouth with red-lacquered nails. _Note to self,_ she thought. _Get some proper lipstick. I'll be needing it._

"Well," she said aloud, and favored the young man with a dazzling smile, "there's no one I'd rather be."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do hope you guys like Margot. Or at least that you'll give me the first chapter of the follow-up fic to impress you with her.

**Author's Note:**

> Come be my friend on Tumblr and Instagram! I am onethingconstant there.


End file.
